September 2010 Archives

A freshman of Rutgers University, Tyler Clementi, committed suicide by jumping off of a bridge on September 22.

"Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly's room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay," Dharun Ravi, Clementi's roommate, tweeted.

Ravi allegedly placed the webcam in his room and streamed live video of the two on the Internet and announced it on various social networking sites, ABC news reports. Clementi then posted a 'suicide note' message on Facebook stating "jumping off the gw bridge sorry," according to CNN.

Dharun Ravi and his friend Molly Wei, both 18, are each being charged with two counts of invasion of privacy for one incident, according to the prosecutor's office. Then two more counts of invasion of privacy were added for another incident just a few days later involving Clementi, the prosecutor's office said.

An East St. Paul man is being accused of assaulting his ex-girlfriend, forcing her into a dog kennel, and keeping her captive for hours, police said.

Luke Brandon Scott, 29, is being charged by the Ramsey County attorney's office with first- and second-degree assault, terroristic threats and false imprisonment, the Star Tribune reports.

A 21-year-old woman told police that she arrived to Scott's house around 10 p.m. Sunday and told him she was going to end their three-month relationship. When she attempted to leave, Scott pulled her inside and locked the door, the door could only be unlocked with a key, the Pioneer Press reports.

Scott then proceeded to lock her into a dog kennel for ten to fifteen minutes and then repeatedly beat her. The woman was hospitalized with multiple facial and mouth lacerations and a fractured tooth, police said.

President Barack Obama has ordered sanctions against Iran for "sustained and severe violations of human rights." The alleged violations include the killings and beatings of anti-government protesters, which occurred shortly after the disputed presidential election in June 2009, BBC reports.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced Wednesday that the sanctions will block the assets of, and prohibit U.S. Citizens from engaging in any business with, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, the country's prosecutor general and the ministers of welfare and intelligence, as well as others on the list, CNN reports.

"On these officials' watch or under their command Iranian citizens have been arbitrarily, beaten, tortured, raped, blackmailed and killed," Clinton said.

These sanctions, and the continued criticism of Iran's government, has been increasing since President Mahmoud Amhadinejad's disputed landslide election victory. The victory led to massive demonstrations in the country.

Inmate John S. Woodward, 47, was charged with conspiracy to commit murder on Wednesday, the Star Tribune reports.

Woodward, an imprisoned drug felon, is being accused of hiring a fellow inmate to kill attorney James Backstrom and his sentencing judge Rex Stacey. The plan was terminated when the "hit man" turned into an informer and provided prison investigators with evidence, such as a hand-drawn map of the area around Backstrom's house.

Woodward, formerly of Inver Grove Heights, was ordered to serve eight years for felony drug convictions that included selling methamphetamine and has been imprisoned since November 2007, according to the Pioneer Press. He also had ordered the "hit man" to break the arms of a woman who testified against him.

He now faces two counts of conspiracy to commit premeditated first-degree murder and one count of conspiracy to commit first-degree assault, police said.

A sophmore, Colton Tooley, was seen running through the Texas campus wearing a ski mask, a business suit, carrying a rifle, and unloading rounds into the air, ABC news reports.

Tooley was carrying an AK-47 at about 8:10 a.m., when he fired off rounds then entered the campus library to take his own life today, according to CNN. No one was hurt during the incident, and Tooley's motives have not been discovered.

Adjacent buildings were searched for possible explosives, but none were found, police said. Tooley is also believed to have acted alone in this incident, according to police.

University of Texas professor Randall Wilhite heard gunshots on his way to class when he saw Tooley firing away.

"I wasn't sure it was real until I saw the bullets strike the ground to my left," Wilhite said.

In a story done by BBC about a German bus crash, there are multiple, effective examples using attribution.

Police, police spokesmen, and prominent names were all attributed in this story with direct quotes and indirect quotes. The initial line describing the incident ends with 'police say', which certifies that the writer of the story has confirmation from law enforcement that what he/she is describing, did happen.

To add something extra to the story, there is a quote from Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who thanks all the aid for all the help they have given. Quotes also came from German Foreign Mniister Guido Westerwelle, the journalist is just adding to the prominence of the story by receiving lines from high ranking officials.

These attributions are scattered throughout the story, keeping it official and keeping the facts straight. There is no confusion, as the people are attributed in a simple manner.

There are 12 people dead and at least 19 severely injured Sunday when a bus crashed near Berlin, Germany, according to police.

The incident happened on the A10 motorway in Brandenburg when the bus attempted to avoid a vehicle that was coming onto the motorway, according to police spokesman Jens Quitske. In addition to the dead and severley injured, there were 20 more who suffered minor injuries. The driver of the car is among those that were injured, BBC reports.

All the fatalities were adults and the bus was a Polish holiday bus that left Spain heading for Poland, according to CNN.

A Deer River man was going 61 mph on 18th Avenue South, which has a 30 mph speed limit, when he ran a stop sign and struck another car, killing research sceintist Ethan Johnson on Monday night. Authorities report that the Deer River man had been drinking much of the evening.

Kevin Roger Doerr, 24, has been charged with two counts of criminal vehicular homicide, according to Hennepin County authorities. Kevin was on probation for drunken driving at the time of the accident, he fled from the scene but was detained by police just 12 hours later, the Pioneer Press reports.

There were four other passengers in Johnson's car, three of the four were injured and taken to Hennepin County Medical Center, according to the Star Tribune. Ethan Johnson was a research associate in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Minnesota, working there since 2005.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation reports that Interstate 35 has been closed in both directions between Highway 30 and U.S. Highway 14 due to severe flooding in southern Minnesota, according to the Pioneer Press.

Waters from the Straight River and nearby Maple Creek have flooded roads, bridges, railroad tracks, warehouses, and parking lots to flood in Owatonna. Locals fear that the water will keep rising.

At a nearby American Rental office there are three buildings, five trucks, more than a dozen trailers, and a 37-foot lift under water, the Star Tribune reported. "I have never seen anything like this," said Pat Doyle, a manager for American Rental.

In suburban Atlanta, an 11-year-old girl is being charged in the death of a 2-year-old girl, authorities said.

The official charge is felony murder and child cruelty, according to WSB news. The girl, Zyda White, died of blunt force trauma while under the watch of her babysitter Saturday night.

The 11-year-old told Zyda's mother, Ashlea Collier, that Zyda had fallen out of bed and that she put her back up and gave her some apple juice, according to CNN. An autopsy reports that she suffered trauma to her head, torso, and buttocks, police said.

Police said that the babysitter's mother is a co-worker of the victim's mother. "She needs to do life," said Ashlea Collier. The maximum penalty for anyone convicted of murder under the age of 13 is two years in a juvenile facility.

Due to U.N. sanctions, Russia has banned the sale of the S-300 surface-to-air missle system to Iran. President Dmitry Medvedev issued a decree banning the sale.

"A decision has been made not to supply S-300s to Iran as they are definitely subject to the sanctions," Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Nikolai Makarov said. It is uncertain if the contract is going to be terminated between Russia and Iran. CNN reported that Makarov wasn't sure and said that "it depends on Iran's behavior."

According to BBC, possession of the S-300 missle system would further increase Iran's defence of its nuclear facilities against an air attack.

Within the on going foriegn relations issues with Iran, the U.S. successfully retrieved one of the three detainees, CNN reports, and above is the lead.

This lead immediatley has prominence by giving a quote by Shourd, which has been one of the biggest names in American media over the past few weeks. The quote then claims that she is not completley free, not until her two hiking partners are returned safe. With that information in the lead, it provides importance that the average American can identify and retain.

Even though this story is not 'breaking news', the writer of this lead still shows the reader that the situation is not yet over. This lead provides the reader with enough information to know that this story is news worthy and provides more information to an on going problem in international news today.

After many feared that a group of 13 Salvadoran immigrants had committed a 'cult-like' mass suicide, they were found alive in southern California.

Searching by horseback and helicopter, authorities looked all over the Palmdale area of northern Los Angeles County on Sunday. According to CNN, there were eight children between the ages of 3 and 17.

The leader of the group, Reyna Marisol Chicas, has been deemed unfit to care for herself and others and has been put under a 72-hour mandatory hold. She gave police a false name and claimed she had no children, ABC reports that her two kids were with her the entire time. The group claimed to be perfectly O.K. and in no need of rescue.

The suspicious activitiy of the group included leaving behind cell phones, identification, deeds to property and disturbing letters.

Four people died and one policewomen was critically injured in southwestern Germnay on Sunday, after an explosion in an apartment building and a shooting at a nearby hospital occured.

The women entered the hospital with an automatic weapon, went into the gynaecology department, and opened fire. The women killed a male nurse and one police officer that just happened to be there. Police believe this shooting is linked to an apartment explosion where they found the bodies of a man and a child, according to BBC.

The shooter was eventually taken down in the hospital with what policed called 'a very heavy exchange of gunfire', ABC news states. Police are still searching for a motive to both the explosion and the shooting.

The worse offshore oil spill in U.S. history had began five months ago, but the well has finally been plugged for good.

BP began acts to plug the well last Friday and pressure tests that went on early Sunday have officially confirmed that the cement is holding. Thad Allen, a ret. United States Coast Guard Admiral, told CNN, "With this development, which has been confirmed by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, we can finally announce that the Macondo 252 well is effectively dead".

This spill had created an enviormental nightmare for millions living on the gulf coast and for the entire ecosystem as a whole. President Obama calls this an "important milestone" and thanked all those who had "worked around the clock to respond to this crisis and ultimately complete this challenging but critical step to ensure that the well has stopped leaking forever", according to BBC.

The well had spewed out an approximate 5 million barrels of crude oil before it was temporarily capped on July 15. This enviormental disaster affected about 600 miles of shoreline and is finally over.

Matthew Anderson, 29, called his wife Friday evening and claimed that two men had kidnapped him and taken to an unknown location in Iowa. Amber, Matthew's wife, told the Star Tribune that, "I believe he's in peril".

Matthew had failed to pick up their young child from daycare that Friday, and his wife Amber frantically began to search.

George Altendorfer, the undersherrif of the patrol division for Ramsey County, told the Pioneer Press that they are "coming up empty". The circumstances surrounding his disappearance are still vague.

One of Minnesota's most accomplished High School basketball players, Bob Zender, has died of complications with a heart filter that had came loose last Sunday.

Bob Zender played center for Edina during their golden years of the '60s, helping them win three state championships from 1966-68. He had also, at the time, set a state record with a 69-game consecutive winning streak, the Star Tribune reports.
His Hornets were 79-1 during his three varsity seasons, with their only loss being a mere six-point defeat by Richfield during his final year.

Zender led his conference in blocked shots during both his junior and senior year, according to the Pioneer Press. He eventually went on to play at Kansas State.

He recently held a vice president of sales position in his family's candy business in Kansas City, Mo. His funeral was last Thursday in Prarie Village, Kan.